Dark That Follows
by TheLokiExperience
Summary: Delaney Sutton knows what it takes to survive: an iron will and a ruthless determination. Tamara Collins and her brother have always been different. Except now, that difference might get them noticed. In a world without hope, trust is a fragile thing. Break it, and the consequences are severe. Rick/OC/Gareth; Daryl/OC


**Chapter One: Never Again**

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><p><strong>AN: Welcome to our Walking Dead story! We have a couple of OCs, mixed in with the canon characters :) We're starting in end of Season 4/start of Season 5 territory. Enjoy, and don't forget to leave a review!**

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><p>Delaney Sutton smiled as she watched her younger brother Jasper jog towards her, dishevelled and tired from having finished his perimeter patrol. Out of all the Terminus citizens, Delaney would put money on her brother being one of the hardest workers. Like his older brother and sister, he might have some qualms about Gareth's method of going about things – but the system worked, and that was the main thing.<p>

"Hey, kiddo." Delaney reached forward and ruffled Jasper's dark brown hair as he approached. He scowled at both the nickname and the gesture. At the age of twenty, Jasper was one of the youngest of the "Termites", as he and Delaney jokingly called themselves. However his age meant that sometimes he could be treated like a child, when he most certainly wasn't one.

"Don't baby me, Del." Jasper slapped her hands away, and both of them glanced around as Sam Collins, one of Gareth's most loyal, passed them by. At first, Delaney and Sam hadn't had much to do with each. But they had both been drawn towards Gareth's charismatic personality in different ways, and that had caused them to become closer than she would have thought possible.

"Hey, Sam," Delaney called, causing the tall man to make a detour and walk over to the two Sutton siblings. "What's Gareth got you doing now?"

Sam shrugged his broad shoulders. "Just running errands as per usual."

"Cute," Delaney drawled, folding her arms. "If you need any help, let us know."

"Hey, man," Jasper piped up, causing Sam to ruffle his hair as well. Jasper's friendly personality meant that pretty much everyone in Terminus liked him. Delaney couldn't exactly say the same – despite all that they'd been through, their older brother Cole still seemed to show dislike towards her. She couldn't say she blamed him, but she also wished he could forgive her for something that seemed so trivial now, something that had happened years ago.

"You as well?" Jasper groaned, stepping back. "Is this a thing now?"

Delaney couldn't help but grin at her younger brother's bemusement. She had been trying to do that a lot lately – smiling. Since what had happened the previous year, and what was happening now, Delaney found that there wasn't a whole lot to smile about in Terminus. So she tried her best when she could. As Sam winked at Jasper and swaggered off, Delaney saw Gareth walking towards them.

"Delaney." His piercing eyes focused on her, and she tucked her hair behind her ear, before he turned his attention on her younger brother. "Jasper."

"Hi," Jasper said with his usual enthusiasm, however Delaney could see that his brown gaze was troubled as he glanced between Gareth and his sister. At first, Jasper had thought it was a good thing that Delaney had found someone. Now, he didn't seem so sure.

"You've got duties to do," Gareth reminded him, folding his arms. "You should do them."

"Alright," Jasper's tone became slightly defensive. "I just wanted to say hi to my sister."

"You've done that," Gareth said somewhat curtly, causing Jasper to give his sister a meaningful look before wandering off. Delaney frowned, turning her attention upon Gareth.

"You shouldn't be so hard on him. He's a kid."

"He needs to learn to follow orders," Gareth replied evenly, taking in Delaney's annoyed hazel gaze.

"He knows how to follow orders," Delaney retaliated. She knew that no matter what was between her and Gareth, he wouldn't like arguing or being questioned in public. He needed to make sure people knew that he was the authority in Terminus. People had forgotten that once. They never would again.

"Without question and without lazing around," Gareth said with a shrug of his shoulders.

"He wasn't, Gareth. He just got off patrol." Delaney, as always, was very defensive of her younger brother. Jasper was one of two people she loved dearly enough to die for. The other wasn't Gareth, and definitely wasn't Cole. She sighed, her tone softening. "Did you want to see me later?"

"Yes," Gareth replied, watching her intently. He enjoyed the time he spent privately with Delaney, and knew that she enjoyed it too. She gnawed at her lip and nodded slowly. She knew what people like Cole called her, behind her back or even sometimes to her face. _Gareth's slut._ But she couldn't bring herself to care. Gareth had saved them, and despite the fact that she might not love him – not anymore – she cared about him enough to stay.

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><p>Tammy cursed as she stripped over yet another stick, her blonde hair falling into her eyes. She pushed it back before she kept going, looking around for any signs of people. She'd been on her own for a while now, having had no luck with any groups she had joined with. It was also partially due to her having lost her brother. She knew he wasn't dead, well, part of her wanted to believe he wasn't, but the more rational part knew it was a slim chance that she would see him again.<p>

She stepped in a clearing to see three people. The female in the group had a katana raised, while the adult male held a gun towards her. Instinctively she raised her hands, inwardly cursing that she hadn't been paying more attention to where she was going. "I'm not a threat, I swear."

"Who are you?" Michonne questioned, keeping her katana raised.

Tammy glanced around, noticing that it must have just been the three of them. "My name's Tammy."

Michonne looked around behind her. "Are you alone?"

"Yeah." Tammy rubbed her arms, the weather was beginning to get cooler now and she didn't have any thick jackets.

"Huh." Michonne lowered her katana, looking over Tammy.

Rick stood up from where he had been sitting, approaching her slowly. "Do you have any weapons?"

Tammy thought on it for a moment before pulling out her knife and her gun, placing them on the ground. "Just those. I swear."

"I'm Michonne." To them Tammy didn't appear to be a threat, and Tammy felt comfortable enough looking at them.

Rick looked at her weapons before gesturing to himself and Carl. "I'm Rick and this is Carl."

Michonne watched as she put her knife and gun away. "How long have you been by yourself?"

Tammy shrugged, "Pretty much since it all started."

Rick raised an eyebrow, sitting back down and gesturing for her to sit down with them. "That's a long time to be on your own.'

Tammy sat down on the ground, crossing her legs and pulling her bag from her back. "At first I was looking for my brother and then it just seemed every group I was with ended up turning on each other."

Michonne nodded, putting her katana away. "Ours is all split up."

"How'd that happen?" Tammy questioned, often finding it sad that there were only pockets of humans left in the world they had once occupied so heavily.

Rick glanced over at Carl who was drifting in and out of sleep where he lay on the ground. "We were attacked."

"Now we're trying to find them." Michonne told her, although it was easier said than done.

Tammy nodded, understanding what it was like to be looking for someone. "Any luck?"

Michonne shook her head, but she wasn't going to give up just yet. "Not yet. But we will."

Tammy smiled slightly, glancing over them. "Any of you hurt?"

Rick shook his head; they had been lucky enough to escape injury. "Nah, we're all good."

Michonne raised an eyebrow, wondering why she had asked if any of them were injured. It was an odd question. "Why's that?"

Tammy smiled slightly. She missed taking care of those who were injured. "I'm a doctor. It'd be nice to have a patient again."

Michonne looked over her. She didn't look like she'd been through medical school. "You look young to be a doctor."

Tammy laughed at that. She was by no means old, but she definitely wasn't just out of her teens. "I'm not as young as I look."

Rick raised an eyebrow. "How old?"

"26." Tammy answered, smiling. "What did you do before all this?"

"I was a cop." Rick told her, but Michonne just shrugged. Tammy knew what people were like these days, reluctant to say what they did before it all because the memories were sometimes too painful.

"We're heading for a place called Terminus. Have you heard of it?" Michonne glanced at her, leaning back against the log she was sitting by.

Tammy hadn't heard of the place before she'd seen some of the signs. "I've seen the signs."

Rick smiled. "You can come with us. If you like. It'd be good to have a doc on hand."

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><p>Gareth stood on his balcony looking over Terminus. It was dark and quiet. They had taken in a few more survivors today, putting them in one of the boxcars for the time being. What would happen next was not pleasant, but it was necessary. He glanced over at Delaney, who was sitting on the bed with the sheets tugged around her naked body.<p>

Gareth remembered when Delaney and her brothers had arrived at Terminus. She had been twenty-two, he had been thirty. He'd thought her pretty, in a cute way – smattering of freckles across her face, dark curls, big hazel eyes. It hadn't taken him long to get her in bed. But he hadn't expected it to progress past sex…then of course, it had.

"We got a new batch," Delaney declared as Gareth sat down on the edge of the bed. "Cole said so. What are we going to do with them?"

"What we usually do," Gareth said calmly. He knew that Delaney disapproved – which was why she and her brothers were now vegetarian. He couldn't force them to eat meat, and he didn't want to. But he didn't want her objecting to his methods of doing things.

"I was thinking we could try testing them." Delaney shifted closer. "Run them through a series of brutal trials, if they pass they could help us…"

"No." Gareth's answer was firm. The words in the shrine were clear: _never again, never trust._ What happened before would never happen again. But that meant they could never trust anyone who had not been in Terminus with them since the horrific incident.

"Don't you think this has been going on long enough?" Delaney asked, her brow furrowing into a frown.

Gareth glanced at her. "Do you remember what happened last time?"

"Don't." Delaney shuddered, and Gareth couldn't blame her. Sure, from when he had met the Suttons, it was clear they were from a lower-class background. Drug addict father, dead mother. But despite the shit they'd dealt with, they were reasonably good people. Yet what they had been subjected to during their time of terror in Terminus was more than anything they would have experienced in their youth. Jasper was beaten for his defiance. Delaney had been raped repeatedly. The memories were as vivid to her as they were to Gareth.

"Then you understand why we do this."

Delaney shifted close, resting her head on his shoulder and trailing her fingers down his bare chest.

"Be nice to him, Gareth. He was only a child."

They both knew she was talking about Jasper. He had only been a teenager when everything had unfolded, and seeing what had happened to his family had haunted him ever since. Delaney was tough – but even though she tried to act like what had happened hadn't left mental scars, Gareth knew those sort of things you didn't just get over. He wasn't over it. He didn't think anyone in Terminus was.

"You should get some sleep," Delaney said, kissing his cheek.

"So should you," Gareth pointed out. He shifted into the bed and pulled Delaney close, wrapping his arms around her slim waist. She listened to the breeze rattling the windows, and surmised that she felt she wasn't doing enough for her family. Tomorrow, she would spend more time with Alice.

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><p>Daryl Dixon grimaced as the blonde woman lightly dabbed at the cut on his forehead. He hadn't expected such a fight to break out, or for it to be so violent. The Claimers had savagely turned on him and his friends, beating him badly and attempting to kill Rick and hurt Carl. He didn't recognise the blonde woman who had been there throughout the ordeal, but was told her name was Tammy.<p>

"Ouch."

Tammy drew her hand back. "Sorry."

"All good." Daryl glanced over at the others as Tammy examined the rest of his face. It was unusual to him, to have someone concerned about the group being injured and being able to actually take care of them. "Just a bit of bruising. I'll be fine."

Tammy nodded before moving her fingers lightly over his ribs, drawing back when he flinched and yelped in pain. "Sorry. Where's it tender?"

Daryl gritted his teeth, even breathing hurt at the current time. "Not sure. Couple places."

Tammy moved closer to get a better feel before frowning. "Take your shirt off."

Daryl tugged it off without question, watching the blonde woman as she poked along his chest. "How's it look?"

"Take a deep breath." Tammy ordered, watching as he sucked in a deep breath. She could tell it was painful for him, but he was still managing to do it, leading her to believe that nothing was broken. "I think it's just bruised, not broken."

Daryl couldn't help the little bit of relief at knowing he didn't have anything broken. Broken bones in these times were almost a death penalty. "That's good. What was your name again? I didn't catch it."

"Tammy. Yours?" She smiled, handing him back his shirt.

"Daryl. You been with these guys long?" He questioned, looking over at his friends. He was happy he'd found them.

Tammy shrugged. "Couple of days. I'm guessing you know them?"

"I've been with them for...shit, over a year now." Daryl didn't quite know how long they'd been together, but he was happy that most of them had remained together. "What about you? Got family?"

Tammy shook her head. She had hoped for a while that Sam was alive, but every day that past, that thought seemed even less likely. "They're all dead."


End file.
